U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/903,283, filed on Jul. 29, 2004, discloses techniques for performing context-sensitive searches. According to one such technique, a “source” web page may be enhanced with user interface elements that, when activated, cause a search engine to provide search results that are directed to a particular topic to which at least a portion of the “source” web page pertains.
Because the user interface elements may be strategically positioned in a web page in close proximity to the content about which the user would want to search for information, the user interface elements provide a convenient mechanism for context-sensitive searching. A user can presume that, if he initiates a search using a user interface element that is positioned in close proximity to a particular paragraph of text, then the search results obtained for the search will be constrained based on the topics to which the paragraph pertains.
Beneficially, these user interface elements allow a user to search for resources that are related to a topic of interest within a web page that the user is currently viewing, at the time in which the user's interest in that topic is piqued. The user can locate related resources without redirecting his browser to a search engine portal page and, sometimes, without even formulating or typing any search query terms. Thus, these user interface elements enable the delivery of relevant information to a user at the point of the user's inspiration or curiosity.
Documents (e.g., web pages) often refer to named entities (e.g., recognized people, places, things, etc.) and concepts (e.g. objectivism, democracy, etc.). The named entities and concepts contained in a document are collectively referred to herein as the “entities” of the document. When reading a document that refers to an entity, the user may wish to obtain more information about that specific entity. U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/584,403, entitled “Contextual Syndication Platform” describes a technique for providing, along with the rest of a document, operations, services, activities, and features that pertain to entities to which that document refers. The content from these services may be presented (e.g., in pop-up interfaces) to a user who is currently viewing that document.
U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/584,403 also describes techniques that enable type-specific operations, services, activities, and features to be presented in conjunction with entities that are of the appropriate type. The set of operations, services, activities, and features that are presented in conjunction with an entity that is of a particular type is customized to contain operations, services, activities, and features that are appropriate to entities of the particular type, but which might not be appropriate to entities of other types. For example, presenting a “directions to” feature may be appropriate when the entity is a city, but not when the entity is a person.
An entity that has been identified within a document is referred to herein as an “identified entity”. Once an entity has been identified, the document containing the entity is typically modified in a manner that distinguishes the identified entity from other content of the document. The process of modifying the document to distinguish identified entities is referred to as “annotating” the document.
There is any number of ways that a document may be annotated to distinguish identified entities. For example, assume that an entity identification system identifies “Statue of Liberty” as an entity within a document. To indicate that “Statue of Liberty” is an identified entity, the document may be annotated in a manner that turns the words “Statute of Liberty” into a hyperlink to additional content about the Statute of Liberty. Alternatively, the document may be annotated to make a pop-up appear when the cursor hovers over the words “Statue of Liberty”. As yet another example, document may be annotated in a manner that causes the words “Statue of Liberty” to be bolded, or to cause a control to be displayed next to the words “Statue of Liberty”.
Regardless of the specific manner in which documents are annotated to distinguish identified entities, the value of annotating a document must be weighed against the distractions that such annotations may cause. For example, the higher the density of identified entities in a document, the harder it may be to read the document. If a document contains too many annotations, the annotations may actually detract from the user experience, rather than enhance it.
The approaches described in this section are approaches that could be pursued, but not necessarily approaches that have been previously conceived or pursued. Therefore, unless otherwise indicated, it should not be assumed that any of the approaches described in this section qualify as prior art merely by virtue of their inclusion in this section.